


Show With the Waves They Breathe

by Lavender_Fields



Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal Lecter Series - All Media Types
Genre: Animal Death, Blood and Injury, Canon Continuation, Dark, Dreams and Nightmares, Emotional Manipulation, Graphic Description of Corpses, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Manipulative Hannibal, Murder Husbands, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Possessive Behavior, Possessive Hannibal, Season 3 Finale, This is going to be morbid, Wendigo Referances
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-21
Updated: 2015-10-24
Packaged: 2018-04-19 19:11:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4757687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lavender_Fields/pseuds/Lavender_Fields
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Life after the fall of Season Three's Finale unfolds for Hannibal and Will. </p>
<p>“It really does look black in the moonlight...”<br/>The blood on his hands was just like Alana had once imagined; darkness, all consuming and insidious. It was what Hannibal's influence had become in Will’s mind. It forced the cracks of careful sanity to unbuckle and break. It moved Will's head like a frantic ocean that had too long resisted the pull of the tide. And so, it seemed all and fitting that both lives should end in the same black waters that had long stirred between them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ohh the plans I have for this story....  
> This will be a multi-chapter fic. I'm planning on doing an entire storyline of Will and Hannibal's life after 'The Fall', shall we say.
> 
> The title for this story is from a translated work of Goethe's titled 'The Fisherman.' It's an awesome little fable that I think works true with Hannibal's themes. I mean, Hannibal's practically a blood siren, right? Right?
> 
> Also, truth be told, I'm actually so wonderfully satisfied with how the Hannibal Series ended that even if there is some kind of official continuation on the series, I'll always think of Season 3 as the true ending. With this being said, I've got alot of ideas I want to get out with this story! 
> 
> Prepare for a bumpy ride.

Prologue

November 11th

Will Graham took a languid sip of his wine, enjoying for only a moment the change of dynamic between the doctor and he. Hannibal lay panting on the floor, hand firm over the seeping wound at his side. It had been a purposeful shot, all major organs and bones avoided. Francis Dolarhyde thought he knew exactly what he was doing. A disarming bullet to subdue the doctor, before he would be consumed.

Will wondered for a moment if this was how Jack had felt standing over Hannibal in Florence- the man framed between blood, broken glass and Europe’s cold stone. He could let it all end here, let the rope that so expertly tied him to the other man finally unravel. The dark maroon eyes that held Will’s attention were not pleading, they never were, yet the profiler felt a pull of influence all the same. That same hand that had once been an obedient marionette for Hannibal’s games reached carefully behind him to feel cool metal at his fingertips. Will let the fleeting moments of Hannibal’s distress dissolve into him as Francis Dolarhyde continued his prolonged speech. Just as the gun handle was securely in his palm, The Dragon’s knife plunged unforgivably into soft skin, and Will Graham’s  mind sparked back to vivid life at the prospect of dying.

All the darkness in the world seemed to be set aflame in Will’s head once more. The profiler’s mind flashed with the memories ingrained in the tearing of flesh. _Fingers and knuckles splitting under cello strings, the fire and recoil of his hunting rifle, both of Hannibal’s cradling hands, one on his cheek, the other buried in his gut._

The blood that poured down Will’s face now was the same blood from Garret Jacob Hobbs that had first been thrown across his spectacles. Warm, seeping into frigid skin.  

A terrible sound, something between a cry and a roar, sounded in Will’s head as he sputtered and struggled, feet lifting off the ground. He was suspended by nothing but cold steel. Soon he was out in the night, back slamming against hard pavement with the same deathly howl yearning for release inside his skull. The sound was mixed with the deafening rush of blood in his ears, in his vein. It wasn't long before that heated rush was flowing out into the world as Will removed the dagger from his splitting cheek, painting the night crimson in his wake.

That same rush held little patience now that it had gotten a single taste of air. Will’s  muscles were soon  working alone, separated from himself. Metal plunged and ripped at flesh  over and over, adrenaline was alive and singing along with the once concealed cries Will buried within himself.  The monster in him saw and smiled at each new tier of flesh that became revealed.  The only existing reality was held at Will’s fingers as he danced with The Dragon, inflicting each wound that he sustained back to its bearer.

All at once Hannibal was by his side, movements and actions freed at last from the jail bars and scrutinizing eyes. In that moment, the three men were tackled and ripped and revealed altogether by the moon.

Will and Hannibal’s eyes met only once, and the profiler felt the last click of his old life slide away. Hannibal’s eyes were momentarily replaced by the mirroring shards of glass Will had envisioned in his days tracing Dolarhyde. They showed him himself, crouched and clawed and painted black. Hannibal could see himself in Will’s own eyes as well, but he was hardly looking at his own reflection. Instead he was drinking in the sight of the Will and his own terrible tidal wave finally spilling into the world. A true unforgiving force of nature.

As Hannibal mounted the mighty dragon, Will leapt forward, his knife in time with Hannibal’s teeth as they both dealt the final blow, flesh melting beneath their heated hands. 

When all was done and The Dragon lay still, winged and transcended at last, Will examined his hands. Blackness swirled through his sights, crawling up into his mouth and out his eyes. The blood was just like Alana had once imagined; darkness, all consuming and insidious. It was what Hannibal's influence had become in Will’s mind. It forced the cracks of careful sanity to unbuckle and break. It moved Will's head like a frantic ocean that had too long resisted the pull of the tide. And so, it seemed all and fitting that both lives should end in the same black waters that had long stirred between them.  
  


“It really does look black in the moonlight...”

He admitted as Hannibal grasped Will’s outstretched hand. The two were close now, sharing the same laboured breath and possessive grip on one another. Hannibal reached for fabric, stained and already drying on Will’s stomach. He felt beyond the rough texture, felt for the scar he had left to remind Will of him all those years ago. It was still there, heaving and straining as Will’s lungs filled with urgent air. “See? This is all I ever wanted for you Will. For both of us…”

Hannibal left an intentional space to fill between them, a fraction of an arm’s length. A decision that had already been made was still in Will’s control.  There was only so far to go now.

Will surrendered easily, holding the other tightly in his shaking hands.  
“It’s beautiful.” Will smiled, letting his swimming head rest and find solace against the other's chest. Still, the embrace was almost timid, as if Will feared now may be the moment where his stag would spook at the sound of gunfire. Hannibal could feel the sense of flight somewhere beneath Will's ease, and leaned into it all the same. Their breathing remained synced until a last exhale of breath was shared, ribcages stilling. Hannibal let himself go limp before a final push gave way, the earth no longer able to hold the pair still.   
  
If Will had hit the water first, he wasn't conscious enough to notice. 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

Will dreamed he was sinking, falling deeper and deeper in the weightless dark. The water around him was still, and the heavy waves that had been crashing against the rigid bluffs were long forgotten.

He blinked and Hannibal was floating above him, eyes open and glowing against the navy blanket of the water. The unearthly figure reached out for him, blood still painting his angular features, refusing to wash away despite the harsh salt surrounding them. Will felt his fingers twitch, wanting to find their way to the surface and the beckoning grasp in front of him.

As he did so, other unwelcomed hands were suddenly gripping Will's chest, dragging him away from the only points of light.

He turned his head desperately, twisting and writhing uselessly  to escape the clutching hold that had snaked around him. Below him were Abigail and her true father, working together again and fishing for a very different kind of prey. Their eyes were empty, throats slit and skin falling away easily from their rotting vessels. The pieces floated past Will, entangled themselves in his hair as they traveling up to the surface like bits of starlight.  

Below them were other familiar figures. Mason Verger beamed somewhere in the dark with his glistening white smile, knife hovering in his hand. His own flesh was  pierced at the blade’s tip, nose missing from the otherwise handsome face. Dr. Frederick Chilton passed close by, though his flash of teeth was involuntary- the skin was still ripped jaggedly from his mouth, and his charred remains were stiff compared to everyone else's swirling and effervescent forms.  

Alana was there too, floating among rigid shards of glass,. Her hair was thrown in perpetual motion in front of her, as if she were endlessly falling through that second-story window.

 

“Would you have told me the truth, Will?” She asked, voice surrounding him as intimately as the water.

“If you had known he would do this, would you have truly stopped him?”

 

Another spectral body winded it’s way up and around Alanna’s falling frame. Unclothed and exposed before him,  Margot Verger’s body curved its way up to Will’s sights. Her flesh was as marred and damaged as it had been in living life, but there was something else, some great hole missing below her ribcage.

“Had you forgotten about us, too? You were suppose to have a family with me, remember?” She cooed, slender fingers reaching up to caress  his face.

 

It was pointless to resist. With each new cry and plead of the circling ghosts around him, Will felt the pull to surrender greaten.  Each sightless figured tried coaxing him deeper, and soon their numbers grew until there were countless bodies suspended and drifting below, each with their different siren song.

The Hobb's family’s grip grew tighter, some of the pleads grew louder, and Hannibal’s shadow continued to loomed over them all, separated and immense. He seemed to watch over the scene like a curious child watches the lambs off to slaughter.

Margot’s soft flesh touched Will’s cheeks and fluttered featherlight over his lips. Her hands explored his eyes, shutting them with a  motherly hush. Those eyes remained closed only for an instance before snapping open in alarm; the once delicate hands were now pushing past his teeth and into his mouth, prying open his jaws and forcing the unkind ocean to flood into his senses. 

Will’s head split open, his cheek filled with salt, his stomach frothed and spasmed.

It would be easy to surrender now and stop the struggle. It could be quiet, just like slipping into a warm bath. All the pain and worry could wash away with him. That was what was meant to happen.

However, as the thought graced him, the figures around him seemed to lose their faces. Will felt a sense of separation, as if departing from the burden of guilt. The water entering him was easy enough to breath, he found, if he only accepted the intrusion.  Soon the cries and clutching hands meant as little to him as the useless air escaping his lungs.

There was no place for him here.

He let go of it all. He let the water consume him.

Abigail and her father let go of him abruptly, a look of betrayal on the younger’s delicate and peeling face. She pointed uselessly towards Will, eyes still wide and unseeing. Margot’s hands dissolved, the cries silenced.   
All faded away.

The world came caving towards him, and Will was alone with nothing else beyond Hannibal’s shadow and those  great and terrible eyes above. He felt the last  sting of the freezing drink disappear, left with only the linger of a forgotten shiver on his skin.

\------

Days passed, and consciousness visited Will in short bursts and lulls. Sometimes he would wake to the sound of distant chamber music, others to the faint glow of candlelight. Once he could feel the surface beneath him caving down under another’s weight, a weak sensation of warmth trickling down his cheek.

After many silent nights and lost mornings,  Will slowly began to blink back into the world, often welcomed by the soft scents of  lavender and something like boiled cinnamon. Finally, he stirred, turning his light head away from the dull ceiling at last.  A calm voice approached him in his abiding daze.

“If you feel uncomfortable, it’s just bruises you suffered in a fall. You’ll be alright. I’d just like to be positive about something though, could you please look into this light?”

Will did as he was told, blinking slowly as this vision became spotted with unfamiliar gold. Soon the room was dark again.

“Thank you, Will.”

He was awake and not awake. Will felt a great stirring in his chest but a weighted heaviness in his arms. He wasn’t restless, far from it- he could hardly remember a time he felt more at ease with the world.

“Dr. Lecter...” He began.

His tongue felt somewhat misplaced in his mouth and Hannibal reached forward with calm urgency, lifting Will’s chin up and forcing his mouth to close.

“Will, you are injured. I need you to stay still while you heal, can you do that?”

There was no response, though Will’s bleary eyes showed a kind of surrender at Hannibal’s words and he swallowed thickly.

Will’s body hardly flinched as the fine metal slid easily into bruised skin.

“Good.  Thank you.”

\-------

With each new episode of his quiet awakening, the memories of nightmares and frigid waters dissolved away  from Will’s mind. The only existing thing was the small room he found himself in.

Steady hands fed him warm broth and cool water until he was strong enough to do it himself. The stinging in his jaw became more pronounced over time, but that same steady voice assured him it would pass. Will believed him.

Soon he was spending more time awake than asleep. Days passed, and he was able to take in his surroundings slowly. He was surrounded by a bed of silk and fine linens, accompanied by four walls and a hardwood floor. It wasn’t Hannibal’s home, or his, but Will felt blanketed in familiarity all the same.

Polite conversation began passing between the two men. Hannibal seemed to always be by his side, either sitting in a nearby chair or bent over his forearm with syringe in hand. Time had no meaning to Will during these times. Each discussion blurred easily into one another.

Sometimes they talked about Will’s childhood, about his father’s distance and his mother’s absence. Hannibal helped him to move past any resentments, encouraging Will to place unfond memories away in favour of pleasant ones.

Will’s memory palace began expanding, and in doing so, he unknowingly stumbled upon old rooms he had so easily forgotten. Hannibal answered his questions honestly, letting Will recreate the past in his own time. It wasn’t long before he had pieced together the event’s leading to his state, one evening raising his hand to feel the rough stitching just newly dissolved from his cheek.   
“The initial wound is completely healed, though it may be some months for the scar to fully mature.” Hannibal explained, watching Will’s face carefully.  
The doctor’s expert hands had made quick work of pulling the flesh back together once he and Will were out of the water and back into safety. However, there was still an apparent mark, hot and angry, healing across the other’s right side.  A pity, Hannibal thought. A wounded man always stood out further in a crowd.  Of course, Will’s body was already a map, one more line hardly seemed of consequence.

Will let his  hand drop after feeling the rough and tender skin.   
“We should have died in that ocean.” Will said, eyes vacant and distant.

Hannibal gave a minute sigh, staying seated so as to be at eye level with the other. He was disappointed in Will’s response. Then again, Hannibal had never intended it to end this way, either. Or rather, he had intended it to end, and it was this continuation that was all wrong.

Lost to the sea, that was how he and Will’s story had meant to end. That’s what everyone would say- the tabloids, the news stations, the young children asking their parents for solace when their nights became plagued with terrors of The Dragon and The Ripper.

The scene they had left at Hannibal’s secluded refuge would tell the story expertly. Nothing remained there but the dust of a man, the wings of a dragon, and a pair of blood-lined footsteps leading out to the open water.

Hannibal had never been one for simply giving up, but he was most certainly accustomed to letting go. He had done so with Will Graham far too many times. One final release seemed to be the only logical way to end it all.

But fate, it would seem, had other plans for the pair, and  Hannibal was not about to waste the precious gift of time.

“And we didn’t.” Hannibal assured, lowering his head to make Will’s bleary eyes meet his own.    
“We two are very much alive.”

**  
**


	3. Chapter 3

It was the day Will awoke to an empty room that first saw him take his initial steps away from the bed. Hannibal, who he had been viewing as a kind of permanent fixture in the small chamber, was missing. There was a small note folded on a nearby dresser, but Will hardly paid it any mind. The fine script it contained may as well have been Guanhua to him.

There had been nothing to push him from the soft mattress- no hunger or desire to motivate his movement. It had just seemed to be a natural transition. A spring seedling finding new purpose in the air.

As he moved, his feet seemed timid on the ground. It was almost as if they were no longer meant to hold his weight. He was stiff, but not sore. Infact, there was a comfortable numbness to his movements. Will’s body moved and his legs obeyed, and soon he found there was an adjoining bathroom somewhere within his small world, all pearly white, but still dim. Inside was a hot shower, and Will found that the hot stream soaked through to his very bones. The mist around him was warm and encompassing, and it gave him another vague sensation of home.

Upon leaving, he found a neat pile of folded clothes on the nearby countertop. Exchanging these for the soft pajamas he had been wearing upon entering, Will’s body carried him back to his small cell. Feeling no desire to collapse back into the bed, his thoughts moved instead to solid door in the corner of the room. It’s handle was smooth and inviting; a patient invitation that he had been ignoring in the week's kept behind it.

He found that the door opened easily, as if it had never been made to keep shut. The short hallway  waiting for him outside beckoned him forward more with faint, alluring music hidden somewhere below him. It must have always been in the air, Will thought. The idea of silence was not a kind one, and he pushed the notion aside in favour of discovering the source of the sound.  

Although his footsteps were light on the wooden floors, the melody he pursued seemed to sense him and stop all the same. A momentary pause, as if the notes were made to ponder his presence, before the sounds picked up again. Will wondered if he had interrupted their flowing thoughts. The idea was unsettling. Before he was aware that the room had changed, Will's sights fell onto the hymn's source. The figure was partly concealed behind the grand instrument. Hannibal's hair was just barely covering his eyes, and his head bent over the piano's keys just as it was so often bent over Will's arm.

“Will, Good Evening. You look well.” The deep words mixed in harmony with the measure around them. The man glanced up with a genuine smile before bowing his head again.

“Good evening.” Will replied in kind, with no real idea of the time.

So far was he from himself, dressed in a fine blouse of egyptian cotton. His hair had been cropped at some point in time, but he hadn’t noticed the lack of curls that had once fell into his eyes so easily.

“There’s a cabinet just behind me here, by the doorway. You’ll find all your personal things, gun and wallet. Only if you want them.” Hannibal said. Will paid no attention, humming as the song came to a close.

“I don’t listen to music very often.”

“I could teach you how to better recognize the notes.” Hannibal suggested, rising from his place and moving to Will’s side. He felt Will’s forehead, making sure there was no fever.

“I don’t see any merit in it.” Will admitted, as if not noticing the hand against his cool skin. Hannibal chuckled at that, satisfied with the temperature he found and dropped his hand.

“One might not see any merit in a sonnet, but we are taught the great poets all the same. How are you feeling?”

“Much better, thank you.”

The both of them knew each other well enough to accept that common courtesy was necessary. 

There were times when Hannibal truly loved Will like this- all fight and conflict dissolved away from his features. There had been moments in Will and Hannibal’s early therapy sessions- back before the profiler had truly understood his own nature- where Will had been sedated, but his face had still shown the shadows and struggles of his waking life. Here, with his usual stubble wiped clean from his face and brow relaxed under soft light, Will looked quite at peace. He almost appeared cherub like, full of innocence and untouched by earthly sin. Hannibal captured the look of his face now to remember when next he took up his charcoal to draw.

Now, Hannibal wanted nothing more than to have Will without the restraint of chemicals or the constant reigning of his influence. On that though, he would have to wait. His companion had accepted death far too easily when he carried them over that bluff, and now that the time had finally come where Hannibal and he were well and truly together, Hannibal was not about to leave Will to the mercy of his own reckless behaviour.

Besides that, Will seemed to respond well to the mixture of sedatives he had been supplying him. It would do him well to give him more time to adjust.

“Tell me, would you do me the honour of dining with me downstairs tonight, Will? Only if you feel as well as you claim to.” Hannibal said once Will had blinked a number of times, uninterested by their surrounding walls. It was obvious that there was little of significance in their current setting to the man. It was well enough. The structure they were in now would only be temporary, afterall.

Will heard, but the words were distant, somewhere far away.

“I don’t expect we’ll be having company.” He murmured, as if it were an afterthought of the request. Hannibal smiled, and he could tell by the sleepy glow surrounding Will at the invitation that he was not about to be disappointed.

 

“On the contrary Will, I expect that you and I will seldom be dining alone from now on.”

 

\----------------------------------

 

“Bedelia Du Maurier is missing” Brian Zeller said upon entering the office, despite his lack of invitation.

Jack Crawford didn't have time for this.

The station had been a panicked and rapid scene since the morning when Freddie Lounds had published her piece on "Beauty and The Beast" escaping together again. It was only a matter of time, and the FBI couldn’t conceal the escape forever, but it had still come as a hard blow to everyone involved. It had been nearly a month since they’d lost track of the three most dangerous minds in the country, but they still weren't prepared for it to be public knowledge. Now they were about to have a media frenzy on their hands, ontop of the desperate manhunt already in place.

"Well, find her!" He suggested hotly, paying Zeller a hard and angry glance so he could look him in the eyes while issuing the command. Brian hardly flinched- he was used to Jack's temper- but he wasn’t moving on this. Even though there hadn’t been any reported murders in the last weeks- outside of the normal drug or domestic disputes- Zeller wasn’t keen on the idea of losing track of anyone who had even a remote tie to either Lecter or Graham. 'It starts with the therapist's, next comes the colleagues...' he thought.

"We know Will Graham had started therapy with her. They could all, I don't know, be in cahoots with each other." Brian retorted, one hand on his hip the other, still gloved, waving uselessly in the air. He was certain that the three of them had eloped again as some kind of cannibalistic three-way polygamous bullshit. He didn't say it out loud, but by the look Jack was giving him, he may as well have.

Jack didn’t shy away from his temper often, and now was no exception. "Hannibal Lecter cut Agent Graham's head open, with the intention of eating his brains - in front of me!" He stressed, as if this fact alone could dismiss any notion that there was any possibility they were working together. Jack’s psyche simply wasn’t strong enough to even chew over that notion again.

“We’ve got enough to deal with right now, Agent Graham being our first priority.” He snapped as his parting statement, commanding voice filling the small office and likely flooding the halls much the same way.

''Agent Graham.' Crawford had been referring to Will as such ever since the disappearance. Probably a defense mechanism. Crawford still had to believe that this was in his control, that his men were really ‘his men’. It didn't make a difference. Graham, The Professor, or Agent, or Retiree, or whatever the hell he was now, was either having dinner with the psycho or on the plate himself. Brian wasn't sure which was worse. Even so, he knew when to keep quiet, and Crawford didn't look like he was in the mood for challenging title's.

'Right, well, just thought you should know. " he trailed off, noting that Jack had already turned away and was no longer inviting him to speak.

Leaving the glass office, Jimmy was quick by his side once they were out of Jack’s line of sight.

“You know, that’s not even our sector. You should know better.” He said, sighing dramatically as they watched Crawford hunched over his desk, phone in hand and silenced by the glass door between them.

“Shut up, Jimmy.”


	4. Chapter 4

“I feel grossly underdressed.” Will admitted as Hannibal lead him courteously through the small hallways of their acting domicile. He wasn’t even quite aware what he was wearing himself; He so used to his plaid workshirts and winter jackets that it was an almost immediate and automatic thought.  

  
“Nonsense. You look the part, perfectly.” Hannibal smiled, reaching to place a steady and reassuring hand at the small of Will’s back as they continued on.  He had paid careful attention to keep the lights dim, as Will’s opiate doses were slowly decreasing, and the light may have irritated his senses.  It was a short journey to the dining room, but Will moved slowly on his new feet.   
  
“It is a rather intimate affair, don’t worry.” Hannibal assured further, and any other whispered anxieties that were in Will’s mind silenced at the words.  

The hallway seemed long to Will, with the stretched silhouettes of their shadowing figures following them down the narrow walls. He wondered where Hannibal and he were for the first time. If they were still home in Maryland,  or far off in some distance city. Before, the notion had hardly seemed of consequence, but now the question itched impatiently at the back of his mind. Before he had time to voice his query, Hannibal had turned Will into their desired room, and both men’s eyes seemed to darken at once with stimulated senses.

An elegant and windowed dining room welcomed them both silently. There was a  poised, motionless figure seated at the sprawling table and a great wafting smell in the air that made both their stomach’s churn in hunger.  A grande, steaming dish waited patiently in the center of the spread, garnished and still dripping in the  luscious marinade Hannibal had been preparing for some days.

Will made out the familiar blond hair parted in soft waves along the other guest’s neck, and the proud arch of their back. The stance wavered, but it was still recognizable in poise.  
  
“Bedelia, please welcome our other guest.”  Hannibal tsked, not unlike a father scolding their youngest child  at maintaining manners.  The woman blinked slowly, turning her head with deliberate ease to meet the other.  

“Will, how kind of you to join us.” She answered.

Hannibal smiled and Will’s clouded eyes landed on Bedelia’s.

He had liked her once; or at the very least, had sought some kind of kindred connection with her in regards to Hannibal’s influence. Perhaps in another life, perhaps in a dream. It was all in the same dark past that Will Graham no longer lived in.

He had questions that he kept to himself, and chose to seat himself at the table instead, already enamoured by the setting.  It had been years since he’d be surrounded by Hannibal’s elegance.

"It smells amazing." Will murmured sincerely, taking a seat and looking the other guest up and down.

"I thought you would say so ", Hannibal agreed,  taking his obligations as host and preparing to carve the main dish.

Upon examining the other guest, Will’s eyes scanned below the irritatingly glistening silver dress, past the dipping fabric and bright jewels down to Bedelia's leg that lay concealed beneath the table- or more specifically, the lack thereof.  It didn’t shock him-perhaps he was still too drugged to fully take notice-though his curiosity was still struck by it.  Bedelia sat plainly at the table, as if she were oblivious to the fact.

Hannibal must have carried her in, given that she didn't appear to be In a wheelchair. It seemed oddly fitting, being that the two had once been falsely married. Will imagined Hades carrying Persephone over the threshold into the underworld.  Of course, the seated physiatrist was far from the naturalistic and fruitful deity that Hades had chosen to take on for his own. Perhaps that was why she had ended up both beside the table, as well as upon it.

With this observation, Will knew well enough what the lean meat on his plate was as Hannibal slipped elegantly by him. He placed the fine bone china infront of Will first, and then Bedelia shortly after. He saved himself for last, but sat down eagerly once the scene was set.  
  
“Please, let us not wait on ceremony. Mangiamo”  Hannibal encouraged, beckoning them to pick up their forks as he did the same. Will took the moment in slowly, taking care to look into Bedelia’s wary eyes when he finally decided to partake in his first bite.  The flesh felt righteous on his tongue. It was certainly something he had never experienced- gazing at the living prey as it was harvested.  Had she been an animal in the woods, he might have thought it cruel.

Bedelia chose not to  engage in the dinner for the time being. A faint smile would periodically twitch at her lips as Hannibal and WIll made quiet conversation between them, but beyond that, she was stoic and silent. It wasn’t until the younger of the three spoke her name that she seemed to minutely slip out of her trance.

Hannibal and Will had been discussing the nature of  human mentality pertaining to suppression and repression when Will had turned to the other soundless guest.  

"Bedelia, you've been dining with him for years. You've always been able to stomach it just fine. You must be a master of both.” Will observed, drawing out Bedelia’s first words of the evening in reply.

"It's not my stomach. I'm quite well." She assured, words struggling to maintain composure. The slight slur at the end of her speech was subtle.

"You've always been well." Will noted out loud, a strange sensation rising in his chest. He had been comfortably numb in -however long it has been- and the feeling of emotion in his gut was foreign.

"Through it all, you've been unharassed, unmoved. Weaving yourself between doting partner and unwilling participant. What did you gain from it all?" He questioned, slow and subdued demeanour beginning to slip. Hannibal chewed thoughtfully and allowed Will free range to explore  in wherever his mind was taking him.   
  
“The devil finds work for idle hands.” Seemed to be Bedelia’s answer in entirety. Will scoffed, dropping his fork down now as he felt fire kindling somewhere in his spirit.

“I thought about your hands often, Bedelia.” Will admitted.  “I thought about their delicate nature, about their _lies_. There’s nothing delicate about you.”  He leaned over her, palms flat on the table, head tilted to the side as if he were examining some distant portrait, trying to recognize the features. His fingers ran absentmindedly along the edge of the table as he spoke.    
  


"You once warned me that the traumatized are unpredictable, because we know we can survive. I wonder just how traumatized we look in your eyes now.” Will mused.  
  
Bedelia swallowed audibly, swaying in her seat to some unheard music the other two men were oblivious to.  The aggression seemed not to bother her, though she appeared more compelled to respond to the direct questioning.   
  


“And I wonder how much of a bird I look to you. A wounded, vulnerable thing in the grass.  Do you still feel that maternal sting? Am I waiting to be nurtured, or crushed….” She asked, words as slow and careful as her speech had always been.

Will’s chest seemed to expand, his presence seemed to encompass the room- a difficult feat, with Hannibal’s own nearby.  His hands pressed hard against the wooden surface below, he leaned forward as if he had been a cat allowing their stunned prey a small taste of freedom before pouncing again. Before he had a chance to rise, Hannibal interjected him.  
  
“Neither.” Hannibal intervened, both of Will and Bedelia’s  gazes breaking away from each other to lay on their host. “You’re here to dine with us. Now please, I insist, eat.”  He smiled politely, gesturing Will back to his meal with a courteous wave of his hand. Will did so silently and without protest, though his spirited gaze slipped back to the female physiatrist almost immediately.

Bedelia still did not move, her glassy eyes staring forward and further than the end of the table, past Hannibal’s face and through the wall behind him.  
  
The two men were blending together in Bedelia’s vision with each word and movement the other made. She wondered just when Hannibal had marred his face so horribly, and how Will’s hair had thinned and flattened against his sunken face. She smiled, more to herself than to the others. It still lacked any warmth in the expression, thought it was as genuine as a laughing child’s own might be.  
  
“They say God created man in his own image.”  She speculated, watching the two forms oscillate between one another. As Hannibal took another delicate bite of his dish, letting the flesh simmer on his tongue at her words, Bedelia wondered how merciful this god was going to be to one of his own fallen angels. She felt that her fall was grace would not be a tender one.    
  
“I think we’ve spoken about God and the Devil enough, don’t you? I doubt either of them will be paying us much mind tonight.”  Hannibal said, lifting the halved bottle of wine by his side and filling Will’s glass without invitation. Will thanked his solumely, but left the cup on the table in favour of piercing another small morsel on his silver  fork. A silence fell over the table as Hannibal and Will had their fill, only breaking when Hannibal became irritated by Bedelia’s motionless figure.

  
“Bedelia, are you quite comfortable? Will was right, you’ve hardly touched your plate.” He noted, folding his napkin expertly and laying it ceremoniously on the table. Hannibal rose from his chair, passing behind Will and walking towards his other guest. Bedelia’s eyes fell to the floor as if to avoid the sight of Hannibal’s approach, though she knew well enough that he was there. Even as sedated as she was, Dr. Lecter’s presence left a distinct prickle in the air that Bedelia had long attuned herself to.

  
“Here,” He offered, using her own utensils to pierce a small sample of the cuisine, and wafting it gently by her nose to catch the fragrances of the dish. Bedelia somehow managed to pale further. Hannibal frowned.  
  
“Are you really going to let yourself go to waste?” He asked, paying Will an almost sorrowful glance.  

Will seemed unmoved by it. Infact, he was beginning to find the civility of the table offsetting. Will’s own urges  were not as Hannibal’s were- decadent and forbearing . His were brutal, and resigned.   He wanted to act on impulse and instinct; to silence Bedelia’s cunning mouth and create chaos from her careful speech.  

“Hannibal.” Will bidded, growing impatient with this game. That same cry that was sounding in his head as he tackled Francis Dolarhyde was itching again for freedom. Hannibal had taught him careful patience, but with his wall’s torn down now, Will had little resolve to  keep his urges contained.   
  
Hannibal read the other’s  expression and knew what it was his companion was asking. Dutifully, he sighed.  
  


“I should have liked to keep you longer, Bedelia. You were once so interesting in conversation.” Hannibal lamented,sliding Bedelia’s fork back on the table. Will didn’t move. He watched a pair of great and sprawling antlers stem from his companion’s back like wings; watched without fear as tanned skin darkened to abysmal black. Even as he lay still, he felt his own world tilt and reorder itself to accommodate the force now haunting  the small room.   
  
“One’s interest stems entirely from…..” Bedelia began in reply, before her words were lost in a seething emergence of blood, a clean and even cut stemming across her throat and painting the fine tablecloth rouge.

A river emerged from her delicate throat, one Will could lose himself peacefully in.  The sound of the trickling blood brought back elated memories of quiet content-  a steady stream somewhere in Virginia, a balanced rod in his hand, and greedy fish at his lure.

His river was sound. Bedelia Du Maurier's sputtering body and wide eyes meant nothing to him here. That same dark figure feasted on her somewhere off in the forest, and Will felt content. He closed his eyes, lost himself in the happiness of release.

\----------

When he opened them again the table was nearly bare, though there was a body resting plainly in a frame of blood. It reminded him of a lilypad laying on the surface on a still lake, even more peaceful than the river he had just visited. A wine glass nearby was filled with something too thick to be cabernet.  

  
Hannibal entered the room again, a silver tray of tea cradled in his hands.  
  
“Ah, I’d have thought you would  like to relish in Dr. Du Maurier's departure.” He said , and the sound of Hannibal’s voice sounded rough and loud in Will’s ears. “But you always do have a way to surprise me.”

The starlight still filtered in through the windows of the fine dining room, but the moon was nearly absent from the navy sky. Nothing but a small sliver of silver fought to hold it’s light in the veiled night. Will felt distracted by it. He found it far more interesting than the sightless and rigid figure that lay across from him. 

“You didn’t need me here for this. This isn’t really my victory.” Will said, trying to justify his lack of enthusiasm. The roar inside him have been silenced, but not satiated.  His head was still fuzzy, but no longer comfortably numb. He wanted clarity, no more tricks of the light to make his eye wink at the hand.  

“What was this really about….It wasn’t about forgiveness, or getting even. What was it?” He insisted,  not angry or confused, merely curious. Bedelia was dead- quite simply, as well.  Hannibal had wanted Will there when it happened, but hadn’t allowed him to take her himself.  
  
Hannibal’s mind had always been a careful maze. They were times when one could peek over the walls and see a glimpse of the pathways and tangled structure, but Will had often shied away from these corners. He had never wanted to admit he was already in the labyrinth. Now, that mental warren was more of a home than Will had ever come to know.   
  
Hannibal indulged him, feeling to hide from Will would be also to hide from himself. “It’s about keeping promises.”. He put simply.  “Bedelia knew what life living with me would mean. Just as you do now.  Leaving me was her choice, and killing her was mine.”

Will seemed content with this answer, and had not planned on pushing the question further until Hannibal hummed and eyed the other intently.   
  
“Tell me, do you know what a roller pigeon is, WIll? I’m sure you do. They climb high and fast, then roll over and fall just as fast toward the earth.” He explained. Will was indeed familiar with the creatures, though didn’t see their connection to the conversation just yet.  He used to watch them as a child. It reminded him of hunting pheasants, the bird’s bodies spiraling down  to solid ground.  The only difference was most of the pigeons were falling on their accord.   
  
“There are shallow rollers and deep rollers. You can’t breed two deep rollers, or their young will roll all the way down, hit, and die. Bedelia was, just as I am, a deep roller.” He continued to explain.

Will’s brows knitted together, giving him the first real look of distress he had shown since awakening. “What exactly are you suggesting?” He  asked, an eyebrow relaxing while the other raised in feigned curiosity.  
  
“Just that judging  by tonight’s event, we should hope the other of us is not.” Hannibal answered easily. swirling the dark wine in his glass slowly and smelling the rich flavour. He took a slow sip, smiling approvingly before lifting the glass out in silent invitation.

It took a moment for Will to catch on, but he soon mirrored the gestured. With his arm outstretched and  wine hovering over the fine table spread before them in a toast.  
  


“I’m assuming Bedelia was not the only promise you’re set to keep, then.” Will concluded, warmth rising in his palms. “You have other ‘deep-rollers’ you plan on culling.”

Hannibal simpered, nodding minutely in time with the other.

**  
**“Save ourselves, kill them all, then?” Will responded in suggestion, a spark of life back in his eyes, concealed somewhere behind the drug’s curtain.  Hannibal gave a knowing smile, pressing the wine to his lips again and drinking deeply with silence as his only reply.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prepare for some good ol' talking bout feelings next chapter. I've been trying to keep the interactions as close to cannon as possible but I'm worried that maybe it's a bit too dull? Let me know in the comments! (Or anything else you want to share :)


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